


When the Platypus Met the Evil Scientist

by Lieju



Category: Phineas and Ferb
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Lovers, Interspecies Romance, M/M, an old fic, i just fixed some grammar mostly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-01
Updated: 2019-06-01
Packaged: 2020-04-06 04:24:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19055182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lieju/pseuds/Lieju
Summary: "I am in love with Dr.Doofenshmirtz" Perry was shocked by the realization. Then, after ten seconds he decided being in a shock was unproductive and got over it. But what was he going to do about this?





	1. Chapter 1

 

“Congratulations, Agent P.”

The platypus in question straightened up a little in his chair. That was about as much joy and pride as he was going to show. As far as Perry was concerned, congratulations weren’t in order. He was simply doing his job.

“Professor Lurchatov has been safely transported to our prison. It doesn’t look like he will be giving us trouble any time soon. All thanks to you. “

Major Monogram stopped, and then continued in a tone that suggested that the topic had come up before:

“Why don’t you take some time off?”

Perry sat in silence. He was very good with those, and could pull of at least seven different types of silence. In this particular instance it signaled his commanding officer he wasn’t even going to seriously consider his suggestion, but that the sentiment was appreciated, as misguided as it was.

The Major sighed:

“I suppose I shouldn’t be complaining about how efficient my best agent is. And the way you go through nemesises, is certainly setting some kind of a record. Is that the right plural? Nemesises? Wow, I’ve never had to check before. That’s how fast you are.”

As far as Perry was concerned, this was all good. It was his job to stop the bad guys. So he did.

He was just much more efficient about it than most agents, so no villain posed big enough a threat for him to stay his nemesis for long.

“So, let’s see.”

Major took a stack of papers, starting to go through them:

“Blasted filing system. I could really use someone to take care of this stuff for me. And hold the camera. Yesterday when I briefed Agent T the camera was pointing a bit more down than I estimated, and well, let’s just say I need to make sure I wear pants at work from now on- Ah, here’s one.”

He shoved a picture of an elderly woman encased in some kind of a robotic suit to the camera.

“Iron Lunged Maiden. Don’t let her appearance fool you, she’s one troublemaking grandma. And classified as a very high-level threat.”

Perry nodded. He could handle that. He wasn’t about to let foolish sentimentality stop him from bringing evil people to justice. He wouldn’t care if his enemy was old, if she had it coming.

“Of course, she operates in Seattle, so you’d need to be relocated.”

This was something Perry had to think about. He liked the Flynn-Fletchers, even loved them. But he had his duty. If it meant leaving his cover-family, then that was something he was duty-bound to do. But he was ashamed to admit he felt hesitation at the idea of leaving them.

Monogram seemed to pick up on this, and went through his stack of papers again.

“Sorry, but it seems you have disposed of all the established villains in Danville. Well-“

Perry perked up slightly, telling him to go on.

“There’s this one guy. Doofen- Doofenshirtcz-. An evil doctor. Who is, based on his name, possibly Estonian. The worst kind of evil scientists, you know. Um, yeah, we don’t really have any info on this guy yet. Not even a picture. He’s on the list of villains to be evaluated so we can assign their threat-level and an appropriate agent. I guess you could go and check him out. And if you think he’s a big enough threat, we could officially assign you to his case.“

The platypus nodded. At least there was something more he could do right there in Danville, even if it was just reconnaissance.

* * *

 

Finding the doctor’s address turned out to be easy.

Although a quick search of the phone book told Perry there were surprisingly many Doofenshmirtzes living in the city, only one company had that name.

_Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated._

It was a safe guess that was the place.

The agent had decided to observe the building first, to get a good overview of what he was facing. Almost immediately, however, he had spotted his target coming out.

Tall, but slouches, brown hair, pointy nose. Fitted in the description the Major had managed to find for him eventually. Perry also observed his brown hair looked unkept and that he had bags under his eyes and in general the look of someone who hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep for some time now.

Also he was wearing a lab coat, which pretty much meant he was either a pharmacist or an evil scientist.

So far he hadn’t really shown any signs of evil. Just apparently visited a photo-store to get his picture taken.

Perry peeked behind the mailbox, preparing to continue following him, when his target suddenly stopped and turned around, looking straight at his hiding place.

Perry quickly jumped back behind the box.

But surely the man hadn’t actually spotted him?

He quickly popped out, only for the doctor to again quickly turn around. This time Perry wasn’t sure if he had actually caught a glimpse of him.

No, he must have been imagining it. There was no way he had been spotted so easily.

Perry stepped forward using more stealth, ready to continue following his target.

Who was no-where to be seen.

“So, what are you supposed to be?”

Startled, Perry turned towards the high-pitched accented voice. How had the doctor managed to sneak up on him like that? He must have been getting sloppy.

“I mean, are you a duck, or a beaver, or what? That’s just weird and confusing, that’s what you are. Also you’re wearing a hat and stalking me behind a mailbox. That’s even more inconsiderate than being a confusing mixture of birds and mammals.”

He frowned, reading the calling-card the platypus handed to him.

A bright smile lightened up his face.

“Agent P? A _real_ secret agent?”

Perry’s eyes widened at this reaction. He quickly made sure his face stayed blank, and nodded.

“And you’re _following_ me?”

Perry supposed there was no use trying to deny it, so he nodded again, a bit unsure how to react to his target sounding so pleased about it.

“I mean, no reason you shouldn’t. I’m Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz, after all. You know The Great Ice Cream Disaster? That was _my_ doing.”

When Perry didn’t show any signs of being impressed, he went on:

“You know, the thing with the vanilla-flavor, and the, yeah, no-one noticed, did they? I went through all the trouble of turning all the non-lactose-free ice cream in the whole TRI-STATE-AREA vanilla-flavored, and, well, compared to the _effort_ that went into that scheme the amount of fear, terror, and _havoc_ it caused was sort of minimal…”

Perry was uncertain how to respond, taken back by how quickly the man switched between moods, so far having gone from annoyed to impressed to happy to sad in less than a minute. The agent wasn’t even sure if the guy was for real. Deciding that whether or not Doofenshmirtz was serious, he wasn’t worth his time, Perry turned around, ready to leave.

“Hey, wait!”

Not even certain why, the agent obeyed.

“You are just turning around and leaving? That’s so rude.”

The platypus turned to face the doctor with an even blanker than normal expression on his face.

“You are just going to tail me and then go home? I’m an evil scientist, you know. I might be up to something _evil._ In fact I might be going to do something very evil right now. And if you’re thinking that ice-cream thing was the worst I can do, you are mistaken. Yes, _very_ evil things are in store for Danville and the whole TRI-STATE-AREA! And if you don’t follow me right now, and _if_ I’ll be doing something evil, it’s your fault.”

Perry was at a loss for words. Figuratively speaking, of course, but generally, he was always certain what he would say, if he spoke.

The doctor waggled his slender finger at the platypus.

“So, Agent P, you wouldn’t want to be responsible for anything _horrible,_ would you?”

At least Perry knew the answer to that. So he shook his head.

The human flashed another toothy smile. “Great! Let’s go!”

And so startled Perry found himself dragged along by the odd man who was holding his hand.

“It won’t be far! I live just a few blocks away!”

It wasn’t before they got into the purple building and into the elevator that Perry managed to gather his thoughts.

What was he doing?

Somehow this self-proclaimed villain had gotten him to follow his rhythm. And now they were heading into his headquarters. True, Perry wasn’t entirely convinced the man was a genuine threat, but an agent as experienced as himself should have never gotten into a situation like this.

His thoughts were interrupted by the elevator doors opening, and he followed warily after the human, ready for any surprise attack.

“Welcome, to my LAIR! By the way, it’s usually far more evil. Just ignore all the pizza-boxes, I just haven’t been cooking much lately. You know, because of all the evil things I’ve been planning”

“And _that-_ ” he paused dramatically and gestured towards a machine middle of the huge open space “-is my vanilla-flavorinator!”

Interpreting quite correctly Perry’s silence, he continued:

“Yes, well, I know its _smoking_. Probably doesn’t work anymore. It overheated a bit and caught fire. It _might_ work, although usually, and I’m talking from personal experience, it’s not a particularly good idea to try to use an inator that’s giving off smoke like that. It smells a bit weird too. I better open a window.”

He turned around, leaving Perry to stand there, feeling oddly out of place.

He made sure to stay away from the smoking machine just in case it decided to blow up while he waited for the man to come back. Perry decided to use this chance to get his bearings.

The big room was an odd mixture of a someone’s living room and a garage, also possibly with some mad science lab thrown in. There were several odd devices in varying stages of completion around the room, blueprints and tools lying around them. It looked like some of them had been abandoned completely, a layer of dust covering them.

In general it looked like no-one had properly cleaned up for a while, there were several piles of empty pizza-boxes scattered around, and the sofa and several chairs were covered by boxes, tools, books and Christmas decorations. In July.

Perry’s thoughts were interrupted by the scientist:

“I must admit, you caught me at a bad time. I don’t actually have any other working inators at the moment. Several on the advanced stages of planning, though. Take a seat, I’ll read some of them to you, and you can tell me if there’s anything you like. Or hate, _I guess._ And find foil-worthy.”

He gestured towards the only chair in the room that wasn’t covered by random stuff.

By the looks of it, it was where he ate his dinners, so Perry deemed it safe enough, and took the suggestion.

The human cleared another chair by unceremoniously dumping the pile of books on it on the floor, and sat across the platypus.

“Okay, this is very evil. Changing the rotation of the Earth. How, exactly, I’m not sure. And it’s sort of more on the purely-evil-for-the-sake-of-evil side. Not a whole lot to gain from it, financially or otherwise. But I assume it would- You know what? I’ll get to that later.

What else? Ah, yes. Bees. I hate bees. And not in the way I hate spiders or those three species of roaches, either. I _despise_ bees. First, I capture an army of wasps and dress them up as bees. And when I unleash the fake bees on the world they will _completely_ ruin the reputation of _real_ bees! The beekeepers will be all like ‘What’s up with these lazy bees that don’t make any honey and that just fly around laying eggs in insects and not pollinating flowers?’

Did you know that most wasps are parasitic and don’t make honey? I saw a nature-documentary on wasps yesterday. Maybe I could also hoard honey and then sell it on huge profit! It’s always like this, when inspiration strikes, I have way too _many_ ideas. I better write this down before I forget.”

“Okay, the next one, The spatula-un-stuckinator! Uh, well, that’s actually just something I’m working on to help around the kitchen. You know how the spatula always gets stuck in the drawer? Ugh, I hate that! Although, I’m pretty certain the device _could_ have evil applications, especially since the prototype tends to less _unstuck_ , and more _disintegrate_ the kitchen utensils in question. A work in progress, you know.”

“What do you think so far?”

But before the increasingly baffled agent could reply, the scientist suddenly pointed at him triumphantly and exclaimed:

“A platypus! _That’s_ what you are, agent P. Um, do you have an actual name? I mean, “Agent P” sounds kinda, well silly. I mean _, I_ wouldn’t want to be called Dr. Pee. So, what’s your _actual_ name?”

No opponent of his had ever asked that. Truth be told, they didn’t usually even refer to him as ‘Agent P’, since generally Perry wasn’t much into conversation in the middle of missions. Or outside the missions, for that matter.

He made a non-committal chattering noise that came out a bit less hostile than he planned to.

“Huh. So you really don’t talk?”

Perry wasn’t certain what possessed him to do such a thing, but he reached for his hat for a pen, and pulled a nearby pizza-box to him.

Dr. Doofenshmirtz watched as the platypus wrote something on the cardboard and then pushed the box over the table.

“Perry?” he read aloud.

The agent nodded. It was a foolish thing, he knew, telling his pet-name to a villain, but he supposed the risk of him finding out his cover identity was small. But he wished he wasn’t underestimating the man.

“Perry the Platypus, then?”

Truth be told, he wasn’t even sure _what_ his estimation of the scientist was. Perry was almost willing to conclude that the man was a harmless crackpot, but on the other hand…

Well, Perry wouldn’t want to be responsible if he _did_ prove to be more dangerous than he seemed.

Also, he had to admit that he was a little bit curious about the man.

So when Perry returned home after listening to a list of schemes of varying degrees of evilness and plausibility, (and watching Dr. Doofenshmirtz zap few spatulas out of existence) and made his report on the Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz, he didn’t hesitate to write

_Unable to make a reliable estimate of the threat-level. But based on personal observation I recommend assigning him a nemesis on a trial basis._

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

“Behold! My Glassinator!”

Perry did so. Or as close to beholding as he ever got.

He had to admit, though, this one did look a bit more impressive. Not to mention it was basically a devastating heat-ray. True, the doctor was planning to use it to turn sand into glass to get his revenge on sand, as well as to inconvenience the construction-site across the street that had been bothering him with all the noise.

But still, a heat-ray. It was somewhat of a step up from unstucking spatulas in an evil way.

Perry had acted as Doofenshmirtz’s nemesis for a few weeks, but hadn’t still figured out what his opinion of the scientist was.

The man annoyed him, that was certain. His plans were often nonsensical, monologues rambling and regularly went on weird tangents, he was short-sighted, unobservant and dense. And despite all of his faults he still managed, for some unknown reason, to trap Perry far more often than he should have. The agent blamed his unconventional methods and the ways he never stuck to the same trap twice. He was just rather difficult to predict. This time Perry had found himself buried knee-deep in a box of sand that was now hardened into glass.

Really, now? Glass? What was wrong with a good old-fashioned pool of acid, or just tying your nemesis to a time-bomb? Classics generally were classics for a reason, well, maybe not the bamboo-trick. Yes, it sounded very impressive to tie your nemesis over some bamboo and let the plants dispose of them by growing through the victims, impaling them, but it was difficult to pull off with any kind of success, usually it took much longer for the bamboo to grow than you estimated, and aiming them at your target was a whole another issue. It usually ended up being a totally non-threatening for a death-trap, and that was just embarrassing for everyone involved. Perry was glad it was going out of style.

Great, now _he_ was going off-tangent in his thoughts. What was he originally thinking about?

Ah, yes, how he was primarily annoyed with Dr. Doofenshmirtz.

The agent shook his head. That whole line of thought was unproductive, his feelings and whether he found the doctor annoying or not were inconsequential. What mattered was his evaluation of the doctor as a threat.

“Hey, are you listening?”

Perry was shaken from his thoughts.

He focused his attention to his captor, nodding . No matter his opinions, he didn’t want to be rude. Since the doctor had gone to the trouble of preparing a monologue and an accompanying slideshow to explain his plan and the reasons behind his hatred for sand the least Perry could do was to sit through it.

True, the doctor had accidentally included several slides from his last holiday in the presentation, but that made Perry even more determined to bring some professionalism into the proceedings. Also now he could add ‘a horribly untalented photographer’ to his description of Dr. Doofenshmirtz.

“I don't like _sand_. It's coarse and rough and _irritating_ and it gets _everywhere_. I guess that’s it, actually. But I _will_ be bothered by sand no more! As it will be all turned into _glass_! Which is… uh. As far as schemes go, it’s in a _glass_ of its own!”

Perry gave him his second most unimpressed stare.

The human sighed.

“Yeah, it- it wasn’t very _good_ , as far as puns go, was it? One would _think_ there are a lot of different puns and jokes you _could_ make about glass, and in fact when I was writing my monologue _earlier_ this morning, I just thought that writing the puns _beforehand_ wouldn’t be necessary, since I could just come up with them on the spot, which is kinda not working out too _well_ …”

Perry figured the doctor had finished his backstory and explanation, and that he could make his escape.

He jumped backwards on his hands, lifting the block of glass still around his feet in the air and brought it down on the hard floor, shattering it to pieces, freeing himself.

“All I can come up on the spot are something about throwing rocks in a _glass house_ , or hitting the glass _ceiling,_ both which I _could_ use, with the right setup, come on, Perry the Platypus, help me out-“

He was interrupted by a webbed foot hitting him on the chin.

Perry spun around in the air, slapping the human with his tail and sending him crashing backwards.

And felt really good about it.

 

* * *

 

“It must be nice being a platypus.” Before either one of the boys (or most likely just the red-haired one) said anything, Candace continued:

“I mean, all he ever has to worry about is finding a nice place to take a nap in. Food just gets carried in front of him, he doesn’t have to worry about money or school or that the cutest boy ever who just happens to sit behind you in English class will never ever speak to you again after you said his name when the teacher asked for yours because you were thinking about him at the time, and now he thinks you’re some kind of a _weirdo_ -“

Perry liked hearing her speak of him in such a way. It meant his cover family had no idea about his secret life. Just in case, he gave Candace the most vacant stare he could muster.

“Well, he is a platypus. They don’t do much. Or rather, for a platypus, just being a platypus is enough.”

“What are you talking about, Phineas?”, Candace asked her little brother.

“Well,”

Phineas paused, seemingly trying to find the best way to phrase whatever he was planning to say.

“I’ve been thinking...”

He paused again, and then continued with an introspective tone:

“I think, that sort of, once the day is gone, it’s _gone_. And you’re never going to get it back. So you’d have to make the most of every day.”

Candace crossed her arms. “Sounds stressful, you mean you’d have to be stressed out every moment, so you don’t waste any moment?”

Phineas slowly shook his head, deeply in thought:

“Not really, I don’t really know what I think, I mean, I’m not saying you should feel stressed out-“

“Carpe diem.”

All eyes, even Perry’s, turned to the green-haired boy. The platypus quickly regained his guise of a mindless pet, though, and only left one of his eyes on the British boy as he continued:

“Seize the day. It means you should live in the moment, enjoy every second fully for what it is, purely for its own sake, without worrying about the future.”

Phineas nodded. “Yes, that’s what I meant. You said it better, Ferb.”

The teenage girl scoffed. “Sounds like a bad way to live your life, not worrying about the future. Are you planning to stop studying and doing homework, then?”

Phineas shrugged. “Well, maybe it’s not a _perfect_ philosophy.”

The usually ever-present smile spread back on his face. “But maybe it’s something we could try on holiday. Maybe next summer?”

“Yeah, sure, sounds like a great idea.” Candace, losing interest in the discussion, turned back to her texting, most likely not even listening anymore.

Phineas, noticing that, turned to his green-haired brother. “Maybe we should follow Perry’s example. Since, you know, I think just by being a platypus, you pretty much live in the moment.”

Perry decided to give this some consideration. Candace was certainly right, you couldn’t live your life without a care in the world, with no worries of the future. He couldn’t, anyway. He had responsibilities.

But…

Fighting Dr. Doofenshmirtz was a part of his job.

And since Perry _was_ stopping him, he was doing his duty and protecting the Tri-state area. So, Perry reasoned, it was okay to take him on on a day-to-day basis, without worrying too much about putting an end to his schemes altogether and moving on to a new nemesis.

For a little while, at least.

And Perry had to admit, the Druelselsteinian scientist was _different_ from any other enemies he had faced. His enthusiasm was contagious, and foiling his plans was actually _fun_. And that was disturbing to the platypus. Sure, he had enjoyed his job before, knowing he dealt a devastating blow after blow to Evil and had took pride in his skill. And he, of course, hated Evil. But he hadn’t really hated or even disliked any of his previous opponents on a personal level, and had always thought of such behavior as unprofessional.

But now here he was, feeling annoyed at Doctor Doofenshmirtz. And enjoying thwarting him. More than that, he actually was looking forward to seeing what his next scheme would be, fighting him, and stopping him.

But maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing, after all.

 

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: I must apologize for the horrid southern accent here. I do NOT know how to speak or write it. I originally had more scenes with those characters, but that accent was such a pain I just cut most of it.**

 

Perry opened his eyes and slowly drifted from sleep to a slightly less dreaming state, somewhere between slumber and wakefulness.

Slowly the platypus slid from under Phineas’ arm, careful not to wake the boy, jumped to the floor without making a sound and climbed in the other bed, snuggling against the green-haired boy, who unconsciously put his arm around the furry little animal.

Perry closed his eyes, ready to drift back to sleep, when his wrist-communicator bleeped.

And he was completely awake in a fraction of a second.

Quickly silencing the device to avoid waking up the boys, he carefully inched away from under the arm. To his surprise, Ferb held onto him. Swiftly he performed the switch-a-platypus-with-a-decoy-maneuver, leaving a log in his place.

He’d be back soon.

What could Doofenshmirtz be up to in the middle of the night? Was he having trouble sleeping again, and decided to take it out on his neighbor who was breathing too loudly? No, not that, the doctor seemed to take pride in never repeating the same grudges or plans twice. Always searching for new ways to fail. But did he have to do it middle of the night? Perry reminded himself that he shouldn’t let himself get too used to the odd schedule he and Dr. D had come to have. He was a villain, after all. A villain shouldn’t try to time his schemes so that foiling them would be convenient for the good guys.

Maybe the usually vigilant agent was still a bit drowsy, or had let his guard down because he wasn’t expecting any of the humans to be awake middle of the night, or maybe adapting to the diurnal rhythm of his host family had dulled his nocturnal instincts, but he didn’t notice the other figure before they had collided and he found himself wet with tap-water.

“You!”

The agent was used to quickly hiding his hat and taking on the appearance of a mindless pet. And luckily for him, it was dark anyway, so Candace never spotted him in his agent-mode.

The girl huffed, lifting the platypus outside. “For an animal that doesn't do much, you sure know how to make a mess of things!”

And with that, the door was slammed shut behind Perry.

Well, he’d just have to use one of the numerous entrances that were on the front yard.

Perry did so and landed to his chair, ready to be briefed by his superior Major Monogram.

“Good morning, Agent P. I've got bad news and good news. The bad news is, you're being reassigned to a new, more evil villain. His name: The Regurgitator.”

What? This wasn’t about Dr. Doofenshmirtz? And he was- reassigned?

Perry didn’t know how to feel about this.

He was vaguely aware Carl and Monogram were talking, but all that seemed far away, like seen and heard through a cloud. Still seen and heard, of course. Perry had gotten pretty good at zoning out but still being vaguely aware of what was being discussed, and still able to recall the conversation later if need be. Listening to Doofenshmirtz’s evil monologues on a regular basis did that to you.

“-good news is you've been relocated away from your own family to this new family in the Quad-State Area.”

That brought the agent back, and any conflicting emotions he felt for the new nemesis-situation were quickly buried under shock, disbelief and sense of loss.

Major Monogram’s smile faded when Carl corrected him.

“Oh! Yes yes, of course. The bad news is the relocation, and the good news is the new villain thing. Uh...just make sure you take your belongings from the house when you leave.”

* * *

 

That was done quickly.

He didn’t have too many belongings. Most of the devices he needed in his job were provided by the agency, or the Flynn-Fletchers.

That, and he was a platypus. As far as semi-aquatic mammals go, they aren’t well known for their tendency to accumulate capital.

But still, he did a very thorough search, going through the house just in case there was something he missed. So when the humans of the house woke up and drifted downstairs for breakfast, the agent was still packing up his things.

So he was there to hear Phineas being worried.

“ Yeah, but he's always here in the morning. I'd be devastated if something happened to him.”

He should have left when they were still sleeping. It would have been easier.

Perry had known this was always a possibility, and he had even contemplated of leaving the Flynn-Fletchers for his job, but now that it was happening, he realized it was something he never would have decided to do on his own.

Fighting back tears he looked at his food bowl. ‘Perry’, That was the name given to him by these people. Would his new family give him a new name?

He turned his back on his family and flew away with his jet-pack.

 

* * *

 

“What’s this critter s’pposed to be? In all my born days, I haven't seen such a thing”

The father of Perry’s new host family frowned, and prodded the platypus with his finger, provoking a slight “grrrt”.

“I reckon it’s a platypus,” the son of the family, (Billy Joe, according the file on the family Perry had been provided with) told him.

Father Joe scratched his chin thoughtfully.

“One of dem egg-layin mammals?”

The son nodded, waving the letter that had come with the box. He read aloud: “Congratulations, you are now a proud owner of a platypus. Have fun.

P.S. This is not a suspicious letter. Neither is that platypus. Or the circumstances under which it was left on your doorstep“

He stopped, looking confused. “It must be some pet-adoption thin'.”

“It’s no dawg, but it’ll do just fine.”

“What do you mean, Pa?”

“Well, I reckon they must be mighty fierce critters, what with being that’s old, what’swith layin eggs an bein the sole survivin member of dem family Ornithorhynchidae. Outlived dem dinosaurs, didn’t they? So I reckon that anything that can outfight a T-rex, could very well scare dem coyotes away from our back yahd!”

The father patted Perry’s head before heading back inside the trailer-home with his son.

“Besids, Ma’s been wantin to get some cosmo-poliitin ambiaans her’.”

And with that the platypus was left outside alone. He decided to do some thinking (while decidedly conveying as little cosmopolitan ambiance as he could). Perry was sure these were very nice people once you got to know them, but…

They weren’t _his_ family.

His thoughts were interrupted by a movement in the nearby crass.

Perry turned towards it, ready to defend the family if it indeed was a coyote. He was determined to do the best guarding job he could while still keeping up the guise of a normal platypus.

However, it turned out to be a rattlesnake carrying a rock in its mouth. Perry didn’t know the snake, but the small fedora sitting on its head identified it as an agent. The snake raised its rattle to its head in a salute, which Perry returned.

Looking satisfied (although with snakes it was generally difficult to tell), the reptile put the rock down. It turned out to be a small video screen disguised as a rock.

The screen blinked to life, showing the picture of major Monogram.

“Hello? Hello? Is this working? Agent P? Ah, it seems you’ve met Agent r. That’s a small r. It’s difficult to tell, I know, but believe me, I’m definitely pronouncing it ‘r’, and not ‘R’. The agent R, that is, the capital R, is Rachael the Rasbora. We finally ran out of letters. And sorry for this, we haven’t yet had the time to prepare your new hideout. Anyway, no time to waste! Your nemesis, The Regurgitator-“ Perry inwardly flinched at that, “is up to something evil. Go stop him.”

And with that, he was out.

Perry waited.

After ten seconds (a bit quicker than the platypus had expected) the major was back:

“Eh, I never gave you any directions, did I? You know, it was way easier when you just went to fight Doofenshmirtz every day, anyway, Agent r should have your equipment.”

The snake reached inside its fedora using its rattle and pulled out something that looked like a watch and handed it to Perry.

“State of the art Global Positioning System navigation device. Go on, turn it on,” Monogram urged him, barely containing his excitement.

A bit wary, Perry did so. It wasn’t that he didn’t _trust_ his superiors, but he was nevertheless relieved when all that happened was that a slightly accented man’s voice emanated from the device:

“Turn, right. In five miles.”

“Do you like it? Do you know who that was?” Carl asked, poking his head in the frame. “Go on, guess. It was Sean Connery!”

“Carl, get off the screen. It’s smaller enough as it is, without you hogging half the screen. Anyway, Agent P, like Carl already _told_ you, in a way it wasn’t rehearsed, I might add, Carl, we were supposed to ask him to guess who it was, not just tell it outright!”

“Sorry, Sir.”

“Well, the surprise is ruined now. And when we are going to get the next opportunity to record Sean Connery? By the way, Agent P, hiring Connery to do the voice-work used up most of our budget for this month, which would explain why we don’t have new head-quarters prepared for you yet. Or any additional equipment. But it was worth it. Good luck, Agent P, you better get to work, that evil scientist isn’t going to thwart himself!”

Perry was glad he still had his jet-pack with him. He just hoped it had enough fuel for the trip. If it didn’t, he’d just have to improvise. He saluted Agent r again, and took off.

Perry was glad to get to work. Although it felt oddly _wrong_ to be going to fight someone other than Doofenshmirtz. Perry had to wonder, what was Agent S doing? Could he take care of the doctor? True, quite often Doofenshmirtz’s inators failed on their own without really needing any input from Perry, but still…

The doctor was his nemesis. Perry had had nemeses before, true, but it had never been like what they had.

_He replaced me once._

Now where had that thought come from? It brought back memories of _that_ incident, something Perry felt wasn’t worth dwelling on. But there it was again, that tiny little part of him that felt glad this had happened.

_Let the doctor see how it feels being replaced._

Perry mulled over the thought in his mind, deemed it spiteful and unprofessional, and not worthy of him. So he made a mental note never to feel like that again.

* * *

 

“Stop, descend 50 yards to your destination.”

It seemed like his destination was somewhere under a rundown motel middle of nowhere.

Perry did a quick inventory on what he had:

His hat, of course, the jet-pack with no fuel, screw-driver(non-sonic), a rock that looked vaguely like President Lincoln, and his food-bowl that he had planned to leave to his new headquarters. Also a banana (that he had kept in his hat ever since the incident with the antipotassiuminator), that had turned into brown mush.

Somehow, using just these objects and his ingenuity Perry had to infiltrate Regurgitator’s base that was, if you believed Sean Connery (and why wouldn’t you), underground.

Well, he could improvise.

* * *

 

Ten minutes later (which was actually a very good time to go from infiltrating your opponent’s base to being captured) the agent was trapped. So far he had to admit the fully automated security system had been impressive.

That navigator had certainly come in handy. Perry was glad they had gotten Connery. That maneuver that had gotten him through the minefield would not have worked with any other actor. Well, maybe George Lazenby. Perry wished the device itself hadn’t been that expensive. That giant robot shaped like four smaller giant robots put together had done a number on it. In Perry’s opinion, giving a robot both a laser-cannon _and_ a flamethrower was overkill, but it certainly had destroyed Perry’s guide.

Still, it was a giant robot, and as everyone knows, you can easily take one out with a mushed banana.

Maybe if that rock had resembled Lincoln more than just vaguely, the agent would have gotten past the motion-detection sensors without setting them off. But he hadn’t, and (after an impressive fight scene where he had used the jet-pack as an improvised weapon) he had been captured by the robot ninjas.

And now he seemed to be detained inside a metallic container, his arms chained to it. Perry carefully tested them, slightly trying to pull free. The mechanic restraints responded by tightening their grip.

So, he’d need to think this through. Maybe if he still had his screw-driver (non-sonic) with him, he could have tried using it to disassemble the device. But after what that guard-shark had done to it, he wasn’t sure he wanted it back, even if it hadn’t partially melted.

He could just see the green-clad villain other side of the huge room, his back turned on Perry, but the agent couldn’t hear anything outside of the device he was trapped in.

But if this thing was sound-proof, how was he going to hear his evil monologue?

And was he even going to monologue to him? So far the Regurgitator had just ignored the platypus.

Perry craned his neck, trying to see what his opponent was doing. And why there were flashes of lightning inside the laboratory. He could see the green-glad supervillain he recognized from the file photo, his back turned to the platypus, and it seemed like he was speaking with someone-

The agent felt like a rock had dropped in his stomach, and he had to remind himself to continue breathing.

What was Doctor Doofenshmirtz doing there?

He wasn’t supposed to be there, he wasn’t his nemesis anymore. But if that was true, why did Perry feel like he had been caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to?

From the angle he was in, the platypus couldn’t see either villain well enough to read their lips, but it seemed the Regurgitator was… Ordering Doofenshmirtz to make coffee.

Perry’s eyes widened. Surely Doctor Doofenshmirtz wasn’t _staying?_ How was he going to be able to escape Regurgitator’s trap and fight him with his ex-nemesis _watching?_

It was just awkward.

Said ex-nemesis casually walked to the device trapping the agent, and circled it giving it a critical eye before bending down and knocking on the glass with a grin and an “I see you got yourself trapped already. Well, saves me the trouble.”

“Don’t waste your time with that animal. He can’t even hear you!”, Regurgitator announced with another flash of lightning.

“What? Why would you do that!? And what you mean ‘an animal’, well I guess he’s _technically_ -”

“Didn’t I ask you to make coffee?”

This time the accompanying flash seemed a bit more inpatient, and the music cue slightly more threatening, prompting a meek “Yes, Sir” from the smaller and scrawnier scientist.

Who went to make coffee.

* * *

 

Perry couldn’t believe his eyes. Doctor Doofenshmirtz was _working_ there now? He was planning to stay? Did he expect Perry to break free and start thwarting _him_? Or was he going to work as a henchman? Why did he have to make this so difficult? Didn’t he realize they weren’t nemeses anymore? Why was he making Perry ask all these questions?

Now he was talking with his new boss. Regurgitator’s back was turned to the platypus, but he could read Dr.D's lips to see what he was saying:

“Wait a minute. First of all, he's _my_ nemesis! And you can't get rid of him now... Where's the fun in _that_? You need to _explain_ your whole plan to him. Don't you have a nemesis?”

So, apparently he didn’t get it.

Did he just expect them to keep on doing what they had in Danville?

He was just so _difficult_ sometimes.

* * *

 

The doctor stared at the platypus. The platypus stared right back.

Perry wasn’t certain what Doofenshmirtz was thinking. His expression was unreadable, which was quite atypical for someone whose emotions usually were very visible on his expressive face. But now Perry was puzzled, and studied the human’s face, trying to read his mind.

Doctor Doofenshmirtz averted his eyes.

And with a hiss, the screen separating them was lifted. Even with that, Perry was still trapped by the arm restraints. However, his legs and tail were free. Perry quickly evaluated his chances. He could turn enough to hit the doctor with his tail, but that would still leave him trapped, unless he managed to get his arms free. And he wasn’t even sure where Regurgitator was at the moment. But still, this seemed like an opportunity that was too good to waste. But-

“Just look at the workmanship here, Perry the Platypus.”

Doofenshmirtz’s tone was conversational, but had a certain odd stiltedness to it, that made Perry stop in his tracks and pay attention.

“I mean, it’s _pretty_ good, but it lacks certain necessary features. Well, good thing I’m here, right? Good for him.”

And he was now very pointedly not looking at the platypus, while working on the trap.

“But I have to admit, his hideout is impressive. He has to have a huge budget. But it lacks some very important features, I think I should get to work here.”

He stopped, and now Perry could tell he was nervous, and trying to keep his voice low. Like he didn’t want the Regurgitator listening in.

“I’ll modify it so you can hear me. That really was the biggest flaw in this design, I mean, who’d make a trap sound-proof? It makes no sense. But if you’ll wait a while, I’ll monologue to you _later._ Just give me time to work on it. My evil speech, that is, that’s what I’m referring to. You wouldn’t want the speech to _suck._ ”

Was he doing what Perry thought he was? He had certainly acting odd, and seemed to be hinting at something.

Not to mention the fact that after his modifications the inside of the trap now had a red button labeled ‘open’, just nicely in reach of Perry’s webbed feet.

Doctor Doofenshmirtz was _helping_ him.

He could just take the chance to escape the trap. But Doctor had indicated he should wait. But Perry wasn’t particularly happy with following Doofenshmirtz’s plan, since, well, they had the tendency to fail. And he was evil. But, technically, not his nemesis at the moment.

It didn’t sit well with Perry at all to follow Doofenshmirtz’s lead like this. He had done it before, he supposed, when his plans hadn’t been particularly evil, but this was Perry’s assignment. It was his _job_ to stop The Regurgitator.

But, oddly enough, it felt like he owed his nemesis (his _EX-_ nemesis, he quickly corrected himself) this. Which, as far as justifications went, was pretty pathetic. But he knew Doof. Perry would let him do his thing, and if it looked like it was endangering anyone, it would be simple for the agent to step in.

But for now, Perry would observe.

* * *

 

“Don't look at me like that, Perry the Platypus. I know what you're thinking.”

_That if you indeed have some plan, you should get to it? Before I decide to escape and stop him myself?_

“I-I'm not some lowly intern. I'm an evil scientist! I'm Heinz Doofenshmirtz and _he_ should be bowing down to _me_!”

_Close enough._

Perry watched Heinz Doofenshmirtz stroll to the bigger man, and say:

“Hey _you_ , Mr. Regurgitator! Let's get things straight!”

“What?”

Regurgitator’s absentminded reply was enough to make Doofenshmirtz lose any self-confidence he had gained, and with an “Okay, okay,” he quickly retreated.

“See that, Perry the Platypus? _Compromise_.”

Perry was unimpressed.

“Who am I kidding? Grrr.”

The doctor approached the Regugitator again, more visibly nervous this time.

“You can do it, you can do it. Okay, Regurgitator! I've done everything for you. See those hard-to-reach files up there? Well I invented these rocket shoes just so you can reach them! And look at this! I even put in the self-destruct button that _you_ forgot!”

This got the Regurgitator’s attention:

“What? Why is it counting down?”

“Okay, well, I may have pressed it by mistake. But at least I didn't push the release button I installed inside Perry the Platypus's cage!”

Perry took this as his cue to break out. The press of the button released him, and the door of his prison flew open.

“Look what you've done! You've pushed my buttons for the last time, you disturbed lunatic!”

Perry quickly assessed the situation. His number one priority was disposing of the Regurgitator, and quickly, before he’d have time to take out his anger on Dr. Doofenshmirtz. He quickly analyzed the situation. Would he have time to run to the Regurgitator before he could act?

And then Perry saw where the Regurgitator was standing. All this flashed through his mind in less of a second, observing the situation, calculating the risks and coming up with a plan before the Regurgitator had even finished his sentence.

Perry needed something to activate the switch…

His food bowl.

Perry ignored the very slight pang of remorse. In the end, it was just a piece of plastic. His mission was more important.

With a clank the bowl hit the switch, turning the vacuum tube on for full power.

The Regurgitator’s attention was still mainly focused on the other human.

“Get ready for…”

What Doofenshmirtz should have gotten ready for, we never found out, as he was interrupted by the vacuum tube sucking him in, and with a shrill scream, Regurgitator was blown away.

“We did it! We did it! Lo hicimos! We did it!”, Dr. Doofenshmirtz cheered, apparently forgetting the whole ‘self-destruct’-thing.

But Perry didn’t. They had to get out of there before the whole place blew up! Perry’s gaze fell on the rocket boots. Had Doofenshmirtz actually planned ahead? The agent jumped in the boots (that fitted surprisingly well his tiny feet), grabbed hold of the doctor and together they flew out of the base the same way the Regurgitator had, but with significantly less screaming and flailing.

This was wrong. Them working on the same side like this. Every sense of Perry was screaming how completely and utterly wrong and unnatural it was for the nemeses to unite against a common threat like this.

And yet, it also felt in some small, odd way very right.

Perry’s thoughts were interrupted by an incoming transmission from Major Monogram:

“Congratulations, Agent P. You've defeated the Regurgitator. As a matter of fact, he just landed in our prison. You can return to your host family, and Dr. Doofenshmirtz is once again your nemesis.”

That lifted Perry’s spirits. He could go back to the Flynn-Fletchers.

“So if we're _enemies_ again, does that mean...”

And that too.

Perry let go, letting his nemesis fall.

“Aaaahhh, curse you, Perry the Platypus!”

Perry allowed himself a small smile. Everything would go back to normal.

Back the way it should be.

 

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

Everything had returned to normal.

Perry could hardly believe it. His lives as a pet and as a secret agent had collided, Phineas and Ferb had found out everything and met Dr. D, they had traveled to another dimension, and fought another Doofenshmirtz.

Together.

And then everything had gone back to normal, like a giant reset-button had been pushed.

Perry wondered if the ‘Mysterious Force’ that protected the boys from Candace’s busting was behind it as well. People from both sides of his life did happen to interact surprisingly often, but always in a way he managed to keep his double-life a secret.

It had been an interesting experience, and very liberating, having his boys find out about his secret. Of course it had been shadowed by the knowledge it couldn’t last, and that he would have to leave his family. Leave Danville. And his nemesis.

Perry wondered what it would have been like if the reset-button hadn’t been pushed, but if he could have somehow kept his family and nemesis after everything had been revealed.

It wouldn’t work, Phineas and Ferb would worry about him and try to help, thus putting themselves in danger, Candace would probably try to bust him as well, and of course Doof would know his family…

Perry wasn’t terribly worried the doctor would have tried to harm the Flynn-Fletchers, he was evil, true, but not like _that_. However, he’d end up putting them in danger inadvertently in some way eventually.

But he wasn’t like the 2nd dimension Doofenshmirtz.

There was something about him that bothered Perry. Apart from how he was evil, of course. Actually, there was something odd related to that and how he felt about it.

Eventually it hit him. He wasn’t _his_ doctor.

And again it stroke him that he wanted specifically him as his nemesis, something he had realized before. But seeing this other version of Heinz Doofenshmirtz, who felt so much more like the kind of a villain he would have preferred as his nemesis before he got Doof, made the agent realize how he had grown accustomed to his doctor.

And it wasn’t just to stop him, of course that was something that needed to be done, and despite his nemesis being in habit of practically foiling his own plans, there was the possibility he could pose a real threat, and Perry took satisfaction in protecting the world from him.

But if he wanted to, Perry could have taken care of him permanently. But he didn’t really want to, and since he supposed some other, more evil villain would just take Doofenshmirtz’s place, letting him stay in business was the best solution from the agency’s point of view as well.

Or so Perry reasoned.

But he couldn’t help wondering how long things could go on the way they were.

And if he really should be that content with the way his nemesis-relationship had turned out.

* * *

 

Perry landed on the roof of the DEI building, ready for a trap.

Nothing so far. Major Monogram had briefed him on how Dr. Doofenshmirtz had browsed local swap meets for buttons, an activity which was deemed suspicious enough by the agency to send Perry in.

But there was a distinct lack of traps, button-themed or otherwise. Assuming he was expected inside, the agent kicked the door open, flew through the doorway and landed in a fighting-pose in one fluid motion.

But instead of a giant button or something along those lines restraining him, the platypus was greeted by a startled doctor Doofenshmirtz:

“Perry the Platypus! What an unsurprise! And by that I of course mean a surprise. I wasn’t really _expecting_ you, I don’t even have a trap ready. I’d fetch some old one, but I don’t really have the time for-“

“What?”

He followed platypus’ pointing finger.

“That’s nothing _evil_. It’s just a scale model of Eiffel-tower made of buttons. Sorry. Unless… Maybe it’s against the copyright _law_ or something? Using the likeness of the tower? You just don’t _know_ these days-“

Perry shook his head.

“No? Sorry, then, nothing evil here. Wait!”

Perry, who had started to leave, turned around.

“Aren’t you curious why I’d build a scale model of Eiffel tower out of buttons? Look, I even used these cute small ones to make the antenna on top! I’m going on a date!”

Perry couldn’t help flinching at that.

Luckily for him, Doof was too focused on showing off his work to notice the platypus’ reaction. Even if the doctor was usually sort of dense he had these flashes of insight when Perry thought he could read him like an open book.

“You see, Perry the Platypus, do you remember my _scheme_ involving _buttons_ a few weeks ago? When I planned to get all the zippers in the TRI-STATE-AREA stuck with my Stuckinator so everyone would have to buy _buttons_ from me? It involved the backstory about my summer-job at the button-factory and the lemur-attack?”

Perry nodded. He had wondered why Doofenshmirtz would have another plan involving buttons this soon.

“So, _preparing_ for that, I did some research on historical buttons and the significance of the Crusades in the development of the use of the buttonhole in the 13th century Europe- That plan went through several rewrites, originally I was planning to-, actually, I’m not going to say, I can still _use_ that one. _Anyway_ , I toured the button-museums of Danville, and met this _tour_ -guide, and we bonded over our mutual hatred of _zippers_ , and agreed to go on a date!”

He gestured proudly towards the model.

“And, yeah, I’m planning to give this to her. I suspect we can badmouth the zipper-industry only for so long, hopefully this is a nice conversation-piece or something. In any case, I really should be going, bye bye, Perry the Platypus!”

And so the agent found himself pushed out of the door.

He felt disappointed, somehow.

Well, that was to be expected, he had admitted to himself he enjoyed thwarting the doctor, so not having anything to foil would be a cause for disappointment, from a purely emotional standpoint.

But why was he feeling slightly upset at the idea of the doctor dating?

He thought about his feelings while driving back home.

Maybe it was because he was worried about the safety of the woman? That would make sense.

But to his surprise he found he felt disdain for her.

How was that even possible? He hadn’t even met the woman in question.

But if the doctor _did_ start a relationship, he’d probably have less time for his schemes, which in turn would mean Perry would be sent after him less often.

Perry had to admit to himself he was jealous of the doctor’s time.

But he had still not gotten to the bottom of the issue, or so he felt. And he had avoided fully analyzing the status of his nemesis-relationship for a while now. That was simply unacceptable. Whatever problems he might have, would need to be confronted head-on.

It wasn’t like he wanted the doctor all for himself (which would indeed be unreasonable). And he had on several occasions helped him with Vanessa. And indeed when he thought about Vanessa, none of that jealousy surfaced. Quite the opposite, he liked Vanessa, almost the same way he liked Candace.

Perry thought of Dr D on a date. Anger. No, not only that, but somehow a sense of betrayal. Which didn’t really make sense unless…

Then he thought of the doctor with his daughter. No anger. In fact he would have preferred they’d have a good relationship.

So he was jealous of his girlfriend, but not daughter?

Could it be?

Perry reminded himself not to jump into conclusions.

He’d need to be sure.

And he knew just how to do it.

* * *

 

Perry approached Candace’s room.

After making sure the room was empty, he shed the guise of mindless pet and assumed his secret agent persona.

He went through the stack of teen magazines. Perry knew he had seen just the thing he needed when he had spent some quality time with Candace. The girl sometimes acted annoyed with Perry, but often when they were alone at home she didn’t mind his quiet company, and was happy to let him on her bed when she was studying or reading.

After a while he found the issue of ‘Teen Vague’ he remembered seeing.

“Are you in love with him?”

He could see Candace had already taken the quiz, and unsurprisingly, gotten the highest possible score. Seeing how it was pretty safe to say she was indeed in love, Perry took this as a sign of the trustworthiness of the test.

He took a pen and got to work.

  1. **He is the first thing I think of in the morning.**




Perry was pretty much certain the first thing he thought about in the morning was whether his family was safe. Closely followed by ‘food’. He did eventually think of him, though. So how much did he agree with the statement? Not at all (1), completely (5), or something in between? Perry supposed that since he thought of the Flynn-Fletchers first, and the family had 5 members, Doof was the 6th at most. So ‘1’.

  1. **I find myself thinking how cute he looks.**




Perry had to stop to ponder. Those kinds of things were something he didn’t really think about much. He generally didn’t evaluate people (or platypuses, for that matter) based on their cuteness and beauty. That kind of a thing had never felt really all that important to him.

However, he knew what people generally considered cute or beautiful.

And Doctor Doofenshmirtz was neither.

But this wasn’t about the public opinion, he’d have to try to look at it completely subjectively.

Perry supposed he liked his eyes. He enjoyed seeing them light up when the man was filled with enthusiasm, and supposed he found that cute or beautiful, at least. Not to mention the mad gleam he got in his eyes occasionally when thinking of a scheme that caused certain odd but not completely uncomfortable feelings in the pit of the platypus’s stomach.

And Perry supposed he found his nose aesthetically pleasing.

And since he supposed the general opinion was against him, any cuteness or beauty he saw in the doctor was significant.

After some thought he circled ‘5’.

**3\. When I don’t see him for a while I feel lonely**

True. He circled ‘3’, since he supposed ‘a while’ was a relatively short period of time, and it wasn’t like he felt immediately lonely, he had his family and the people and agents from OWCA for company as well.

**4\. I talk about him to everyone I meet.**

Perry circled ‘1’. Never.

**5\. When I think about my wedding, I can picture him as my groom** **.**

Perry stared at the question for a while. And decided to skip it.

**6\. I find myself smiling for no reason.**

This confused Perry. When he was smiling, of course there was always a reason for it. So he circled ‘1’.

**7\. I always like it when I find out we have things in common.**

You probably shouldn’t be pleased to find out you had things in common with a bad guy. And yet, Perry had been happy to find they had the same taste in soaps. After all, that was something he couldn’t share with his family, and Major and Carl weren’t interested…

‘4’, then.

**8\. Seeing him makes me happy.**

‘5’.

**9\. I often worry what he thinks of me.**

Perry wasn’t in habit of wondering what people thought of him. He strove to be the best at what he did, to be a good person (or a platypus). But not because he worried about his public image. He worried about what his family thought about him, though, but because he didn’t want them to find out about his double-life.

‘2’, maybe? He did sometimes worry the doctor would find out something he shouldn’t.

**10\. I get upset if he is on a date with someone else.**

‘5’.

 

There, finished. Perry added up his points and after getting his score looked for his result.

“You think of him as a friend”

Perry thought about it, and decided the test wasn’t valid if he skipped some questions.

So he went back to question Nr. 5. Well, certainly now that the magazine had brought up the issue Perry could picture himself marrying Doofenshmirtz. Not that the prospect was plausible or even appealing.

Just in case, though, he circled ‘5’.

Also looking back at the other questions, he supposed that a ‘while’ could be interpreted to mean a longer period of time. And since he would eventually miss the doctor, ‘5’ would probably be closer to the truth.

Also, he supposed the magazine meant smiling for no _good_ reason, or for unusual reasons. If former, well, Perry still thought ‘1’ was the correct answer. When Dr. Doofenshmirtz made him smile it _was_ for a good reason. But if it meant the latter, it probably was unusual for an evil scientist to get his nemesis to smile the way he did. A victorious smirk, maybe, when the villain was defeated, (although Perry thought it wasn’t exactly good guy-behavior to take joy in the suffering of others) but just being happy to see him? Or offering an encouraging smile when his nemesis was feeling down? Not exactly text-book protocol. Finally Perry changed his answer to ‘3’, as a compromise.

Satisfied the answers now reflected his situation better, he added up the points again, and this time the score was high enough to get another result.

“You are in love with him”

_I am in love with Doofenshmirtz._

Perry was in a shock. Then, after ten seconds he decided being in a shock was unproductive and got over it. But it left the question for him to deal with. What was he going to do about it?

 

 


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: I have a feeling I stole the idea for Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s hat-scheme from somewhere, but I can’t remember where exactly, or if I actually did come up with it myself. In any case, it’s such a Doof thing to do I used it anyway. I guess if I did steal it, I can claim it’s an homage.**

 

_I am in love with Doofenshmirtz._

Perry was in a shock. Then, after ten seconds he decided being in a shock was unproductive and got over it. But it left the question for him to deal with. What was he going to do about it?

‘Nothing’ seemed like a good idea. There really wasn't any reason for him to change the way he acted around the doctor, any possible steps towards, whatever the thing it might move towards was, would only get in the way of his job. How things were with his nemesis now were good. No need for any complications. 

* * *

“What? What are you looking at?” Dr. Doofenshmirtz paused his monologue on how he was going to take over the Tri-state-area by getting everyone’s hats pulled over their eyes so they couldn’t see.

The agent hadn’t realized he had let his gaze linger on the model of the Eiffel-tower long enough for the doctor to notice. But he had, which, considering the platypus was hanging upside-down restrained by a top-hat, was impressive and one of those instances when the doctor seemed to be extremely observant.

“This? Yeah, I was planning to give it to Mary, that’s the _button_ -woman I mentioned, you remember? Anyway, it turned out she was into _buttons_. Like, way too much. _Completely_ unable to talk about anything else. Also she was convinced the zipper-industry is secretly _in charge_ of the US government. Which is fair enough, but she was also convinced zippers were based on ancient Viking technology given to them by ancient aliens masquerading as the Norse gods. Which _also_ sounds kinda plausible now that I think about all the weird stuff, including aliens, that I have seen. But still, she was a _total_ weirdo. Anyway, I liked this model too much to let her have it, so I brought it back with me.”

He shrugged.

“You can have it if you want to. Now that I think about it, it was mostly _spite_ that made me take it back, and whether you or I have it, the most important thing is she doesn’t.”

And so, after destroying the Hat-pullinator, Perry ended up carrying the model of Eiffel-tower back home, uncertain what to do with it. He could have thrown it away, he supposed Heinz wouldn’t have minded too much, as long as the button-obsessed Mary didn’t get it. But it was a gift, and throwing away a gift wasn’t good manners. And there was a possibility Doof  _would_ mind, not that he’d know…

Unless he asked what Perry had done with it.

In the end the agent put it in the small closet for personal belongings he had in his underground base. There wasn’t much. A pair of novelty-antlers he had gotten from Major Monogram last Christmas, a framed picture of him in his agent-persona with his boys, taken before their memories had been wiped, and the vase he had gotten from his nemesis last Christmas.

* * *

“Mom, mom!”

“What is it, Candace?”

“Phineas and Ferb baked a cake!”

Perry meandered to the group, waiting to be noticed.

“Okay, that in itself isn’t especially bust-worthy, but it’s _how_ they did it! With one of those Rube Goldberg machines! A HUGE one! There was a lot of dominoes, and falling things tipping scales and a trained elephant and more dominoes and… I can see how this is going to end… Okay, mom, you can just say it, I’m crazy, talking crazy-things.”

“Have some cake.”

Resigned, the girl took her mother’s suggestion, mumbling: “And you would have seen it too, if it weren’t for that hat blinding the elephant that panicked and destroyed all the evidence.”

“That hat was key for the Rube Goldberg machine to work properly, I don’t know what happened to it.”

Their mother had, of course, wandered away just in time to completely miss Phineas say this.

“Maybe next time we should use an osprey instead. No need for a hat,” Ferb suggested.

“Yeah, it would take less room too. Oh, here’s Perry.”

“Krkrkrkt”

That over with, Perry decided to retire to bed early. He had a lot to think about.

On other hand, if Dr. Doofenshmirtz had gotten a girl-friend, that would have solved Perry’s problem for him, since he couldn’t have done anything about his situation.

But since he wasn’t currently in a relationship…

Even though there were surprisingly many platypuses in Danville, Perry had never been really all that interested in spending time with them. He did have some idea on what platypus-romance involved, thanks to that one time Phineas and Ferb had made him watch that nature-documentary they had thought he’d find interesting, and he had no desire to go down  _that_ route.

So he supposed it would be better to observe human couples and model his strategy based on a successful relationship or two.

He thought of his favorite soaps, but decided against trusting them for advice on human interaction. Although sometimes he thought the life in Danville, at least when it came to Phineas’ and Ferb’s inventions, was governed by some kind of narrative convenience.

But in any case, there weren’t too many happy relationships in the tv-shows he followed. They tended to get interrupted by cheating, or evil twins, or lawsuits, or everything just turning out to be a dream.

So he turned his thoughts to couples he knew personally.

There were Isabella and Phineas. Not a couple, exactly, not yet anyway. But there was probably something to be learned from the way Isabella approached the problem. They were friends, and really, had a good and close relationship.

However, she had kissed him, right before their memories had been wiped. That didn’t really make sense for Perry. It wasn’t like she remembered it either. Or had used the opportunity to take a risk and find out what the object of her affections thought of the prospect of a romantic relationship. In any case, she hadn’t been yet successful in turning their friendship romantic, and since they were both still kids, that was just as well.

Then there was Candace.

She had a very obsessive personality. It wasn’t that Perry didn’t like her (quite the opposite), but he didn’t really understand why Jeremy wanted to be with her. 

Still, if anything, you could learn from their relationship that it helped being persistent. And that there was someone for everyone.

Major Monogram was married, but Perry didn’t know much about his life outside of work. And Carl didn’t have much success with romance as far as Perry knew.

Vanessa had a boy-friend, but Perry didn’t know much about her friendships, and whether her relationship with Johnny was serious.

And of course there were Linda and Lawrence.

At first Perry dismissed them, but when he thought about it, actually they were exactly the kind of a couple he would want to emulate. And there were certain parallels to him and Doctor Doofenshmirtz. They were adults, who had formed their relationship as grown-ups, after already having kids and past relationships. And they worked together, and made that work.

It wasn’t that Perry could, or even wanted to, end up like they did.

Although now that he thought about it, when it came to most of the ‘married-people-stuff’, he could see himself doing it with his nemesis. Actually, a lot of that stuff they had  _already_ done. Going shopping, throwing a birthday-party for Vanessa, just spending time together, Doof taking him to that Pageant of Evil as a what could be described as his ‘date’…

If he could isolate what made the human interaction work and how it could be applied to his situation, maybe he could figure out the right course of action... 

He let out a frustrated ‘krkrkrt’. 

It felt like he was missing something here. 

He couldn’t just change their relationship into something it wasn’t. And did he even want to? Shouldn’t he try to build on what they already had?

Should he even  _do_ anything? Or have the doctor take the next step? What was the protocol here?

And Perry realized he had been thinking about this all wrong. He had to think of this problem like a mission, he always knew how to act during those. All he'd have to do was approach the situation like it was one of doctor's schemes.

So, Doofenshmirtz had trapped him by making him feel like this, now how was he going to escape?

He thought of it for a moment, then abandoned that scenario altogether, partly because it would have meant these feelings were something to get rid of.

He tried again.

Doctor's scheme was to make him feel confused and uncertain of how to act. By mainly being himself. And by having a cute nose.

Or, rather putting Perry in this situation without even realizing it himself. But now he was wreaking havoc in Perry's life by putting him in this difficult position and either not knowing what the situation was or acting like he had no idea.

So all Perry would have to do was to beat up his obliviousness out of him and make their relationship explode on his face.

Perry mulled over that a bit, pondering about the metaphors involved.

But eventually he had a plan.

 

* * *

Perry the Platypus stood outside Doofenshmirtz's door, trying to decide how to enter.

The usual "crash through the ceiling" thing seemed a bit rude, considering he wasn't expected.

But ringing his doorbell was out of the question because he was on a mission to thwart him, after all.

He decided to go with opening his door with his keys and walking in unannounced.

What he was about to do was not, surprisingly, forbidden by the O.W.C.A. guidelines. Oddly enough, the rulebook  _did_ forbid eating your nemesis (even if you planned to spit them out later) and telling your nemesis’ mother what they were up to so they could be grounded. 

So Perry had turned his wrist-communicator off, just on the off chance Major Monogram would decide to contact him. He wasn’t planning to inspire a new amendment to the rules. 

He found the doctor sitting in his chair, watching TV. 

Startled, the human jumped up, then seeing who it was sank back into his chair.

"You scared me, Perry the Platypus! Why would you walk in someone else's home like that, without warning? I'm not even doing anything  _evil_ right now, unless you count stealing cable from my neighbo-"

His ramblings were cut short by a kick to the chin.

While the scientist was still dazed, Perry pulled him on his eye-level.

And kissed him.

Initially it was mostly just a collision of beak and lips, but Perry quickly adjusted his position to better match the shape of the human’s mouth, hoping it was an acceptable approximation of what he had observed human couples doing.

The agent might not have been that knowledgeable on kissing, but from what he understood of it, both parties were supposed to participate in it, and despite the kiss going on for several seconds, it was most certainly one-sided.

So he let the doctor go.

The said human made a some kind of an attempt to back away, but was a bit uncertain and shaken, falling on his butt and then backing away from the platypus until his back hit the wall.

Doofenshmirtz’s reaction made Perry’s heart sink in a way he hadn’t been prepared for.

Not only had he not returned the kiss, he actively attempted to get away from it.

“What in _Hühnerstall des Grauens_ was that all about!?”

His voice was even more high-pitched than usual.

Both the evil scientist and the platypus stared at each other.

And the latter realized he didn’t really have any follow-up plan. He had sort of assumed Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s reaction to what he did would help him improvise the next step. That’s how their encounters usually went.

He had predicted he’d either return his feelings or kick him in the head, both scenarios he felt like he could handle.

But the doctor just sat there, staring at him, his eyes wider than the agent had ever seen.

So Perry turned and walked out of the door.

And somehow the fact that his exit wasn’t accompanied by the “Curse you, Perry the Platypus!” felt the worst of all.

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

 

 

“Hey, there’s Perry.”

“Well, duh, looks like he’s sleeping.”

Phineas turned towards his big sister with a worried look on his face. “But that’s the thing, he’s right there. In fact he hasn’t been disappearing for a week now.”

Candace shrugged. “Isn’t that good, then? I mean, I don’t see what the problem here is. That our pet is safe and sound?”

The boy sat down next to Perry’s basket and petted him.

“I guess you’re right. But he seems, I don’t know, less energetic than before. Maybe he’s sick or something.”

“Well, he’s a platypus. They don’t do much.”

Perry got up and walked to his food-bowl, trying to appear active enough to look healthy, but inactive enough to be described as ‘not doing much’. He wouldn’t want his family to worry about him, or start suspecting something was wrong.

But the truth was he hadn’t left the house for a week now.

The doctor had apparently put his schemes on a hiatus, and hadn’t given the organization any reason to send Perry to stop him for a whole week. And Perry had stayed away from D.E.I. But at this rate Major would eventually send him over to the doctor’s place, if just to check up on him.

And a part of Perry wished it would be soon.

Then he’d _have_ to take some action, do something about this mess.

Maybe it would be better to request being assigned to another nemesis.

But that might also mean he’d be assigned a new host family.

So not only had he ruined any animosity he had had with his nemesis, he had also risked losing his family. How could he had been so foolish? Well, it was too late to worry about it. Regret wasn’t one of the feelings Perry felt often. If a mistake had been made, it was no use feeling bad about it, that would only interfere with the efforts to fix the problem. You just did your best to set things right, and tried to learn from your mistakes.

But now he didn’t have any idea how to go on about fixing this.

He was shaken from these bleak thoughts by a bleep from his wrist-communicator.

* * *

 

 

Perry crashed in through the window, landing on a fighting pose. Any hesitation he might have had disappeared as he worked almost on muscle memory alone, doing something he had done countless times before.

But as he was trapped in front of his nemesis, it all started to come back.

“Ah, Perry the Platypus, I was wondering when you’d show up. Do you like the trap? It’s an old projector, I borrowed it from Professor Douser, actually, so I’d appreciate it if you escaped it without breaking it. Originally I was planning to trap you by wrapping you in film, but when I thought about it I realized I had already done that, so I had to improvise. “

So this was it? He just planned to keep on going like they had before and pretend that it had never happened? It was definitely a relief. But on the other hand, part of Perry couldn’t help but to feel disappointed. He had gone through all that worrying and planning for things to stay completely the same?

He wasn’t exactly certain what he had expected, but maybe this was what must happen; things must stay the same. What exactly had happened? Had the doctor forgotten? No matter, Perry would worry about that later.

He started working on escaping the trap, when the doctor spoke.

“So, Perry the Platypus, this is how we are going to do this.”

Perry stopped his escape-attempt, giving the doctor his undivided attention, ready to listen to whatever backstory he was about to give this time.

“See this?”

He gestured to the inator behind him.

“This is my latest invention. The Monochrominator! It drains color from things. I’ll tell you the whole backstory that explains this whole scheme. Then you escape, we fight, and so on. The usual. But! This time there’s something additional at stake. You see, Perry the Platypus, _afterwards_ we are going out to have dinner and after that go to the movies. And if _you_ manage to thwart me and destroy my inator I’ll pay for the dinner and you get to choose the movie. And if _I_ win, you’ll treat me to dinner and we will see a movie of my choosing, a black-and-white film, I _suppose..._ ”

The scientist stopped his well-rehearsed-sounding speech, and continued on a much more uncertain tone:

“So, uh, if, you know- If I didn’t _totally_ misinterpret that whole thing you did the other day, in which case this is kinda _awkward_ , not that we couldn’t just go on a date as friends or enemies, as the- Um…“

Silence, that mirrored the one when Perry had kissed him, fell. Like back then, Perry was uncertain how to proceed, but now there was the feeling things were moving to the right direction. And clearly it was his turn to respond, in order to move things along.

“Krkrkrt…”

“Really? I mean, I’m going to take that as a _‘yes’_ , because of how _embarrassing_ it would be otherwise, and by the way, I’m sorry about this scheme, I mean, it’s a great one, I actually think I have a slight chance of not ending up _paying_ for the date here! Which might be a problem, now that I think about it, since I’m not sure if you have any money, although I guess that since you have a job, you must also be paid? Anyway, as I was _saying_ , before I interrupted myself, I think it would have been nicer if this scheme would be something _special,_ Charlene never forgot our first date, although that might have been because of the exploding water-heater and all the rather aggressive _ducks_ , and now I’m thinking I probably shouldn’t talk about my ex-wife, considering, but you already know about her and I guess you won’t mind, since you know how it is, and I think I probably should stop talking?”

Perry nodded.

“Yes, thought so.”

Another silence, but shorter and less awkward this time.

“Anyway, time for BACKSTORY! I never forget the first movie I saw, although you must remember that when I say ‘’movie’, I mean the Druelselsteinian equivalent which involved the traveling barber-surgeon reenacting movies he had seen with some potatoes- “

And with that, all the awkwardness melted away, and both the evil scientist and the secret agent fell back into the comfortable routine.

Everything had gone back to normal. Well, almost.

Perry supposed there would be a lot of awkwardness ahead, for one he had no good idea what one was expected to do on a first date, but he was confident he could improvise.

And maybe, even if things went a bit wrong, it would all turn out for the best in the end.

 

 


End file.
